Five People Who Met Michael Tritter
by TrenchcoatsAreSexy
Summary: And Three Who Didn't - Tritter's a man of many faces.


**Five People Who Met Michael Tritter (And Three Who Didn't)**

**1. ** He meets House after two hours of observing him, and he's not impressed. Despite the cane, the arrogant manner in the doctor infuriates him – maybe _because_ of the cane. It's what he focuses on when he resolves to bring the man back down to Earth with a crash – and whips his foot out. House is used to getting what he wants, but Tritter is, too, and he has an advantage. The thermometer is a dirty trick – or maybe, a fair shot, but he doesn't know that Tritter never loses. And in this game of rock, paper, scissors, handcuffs trump thermometers.

**2. ** Wilson's worry is inherent in his deep brown eyes. Tritter can't help but wonder how House acquired this man as a friend, so thoroughly different. Can't help but feel a twinge of guilt as he questions him, sees the shock at the forged prescriptions, and the uneasiness of a rare Wilson lie. He's done this too many times before, pitting friends against each other, but he is sure Wilson will eventually fold. He's an inherent martyr – but wasn't Judas, too, molded in the hands of liars saying he was doing what was best? Ready to go, with just one kiss.

**3. ** Cameron loves House. Of this Tritter is convinced. It's a sad thing to see, a black hole, an abusive relationship – no, not even that, a self-destructive obsession. She reminds him of the little fourteen-year-old girls, led away by college boys or 30-somethings with ulterior motives. He wishes to shake her out of it, that he could tell her to stop fooling herself, that there is no way that House can bring her anything but a deep rot, from the inside out, that she won't notice until she starts coughing up blood and bile. He doesn't spend very much time on Cameron.

**4. ** If Wilson is House's well-intentioned Judas, and Cameron his steadfast, if doomed, Mary Magdalene, Foreman must be his unwitting Peter, loyal to a fault and willing to fall on his sword. Tritter curses the religion he's sloughed off, for providing him with these ironic analogies, for he figures that the historical Jesus couldn't have been nearly as obnoxious as House. Or perhaps that's why they crucified him. Foreman is unshakeable, not surprising for a man who probably hails from a neighborhood where "no snitching" is as engrained as law. Tritter knows this type; after all, he used to be one.

**5. ** Miranda loves Tritter but doesn't understand why. Can't understand why a young black female falls for Michael Tritter of all people. He's been mocked and disgraced since the House debacle, nearly fired and already set apart from everyone on the force. But he is her partner; she has seen Michael Tritter risk his life; she is there when he nearly dies saving a woman from a blaze set by her husband. Miranda also knows he will never love her; she doubts that love is even programmed into his system. But she is the closest to possibly knowing him of anyone.

**1. ** Tritter would never know what to make of Amber. Beautiful, cutthroat, and without remorse, maybe a female House? Tritter would not be surprised when she dates Wilson, and then saddened, but not shocked, to hear she died because of House. He'd wonder how many lives House has taken indirectly, and whether that can ever measure up against those he's saved. Wilson had told him that House was a positive force in the universe; he'd wonder if he still believes that now. He'd wonder how much damage Amber could have done; a House without a cane to warn ahead.

**2. ** Tritter never meets Kutner, but he reads the police report. He shakes his head when he realizes Kutner was one of House's chosen fellows. He thinks of what buttons House must have pushed, which pressure points finally broke him. He wonders if House realized he was playing with a traumatized (and Kutner must have been, given his history) psyche like it was a rubber ball to bounce against a wooden floor. He comes to the conclusion that even if House knew, he didn't care. He reminds himself again to stop searching for mentions of House's name in the computer system.

**3. ** Britney has been with the whole station, but only Tritter gets her pregnant. He doesn't know she'll be named April, even though she's born in June, and that her blonde hair and ice blue eyes leave little doubt that she is his. Four months in, he is a first responder to a gas explosion not far from Princeton's campus. He is pinned underneath a fallen plank, and he cannot see. The last thing he hears is a doctor's instructions to try and amputate to save his life, and he is almost, almost sure he hears the clatter of a cane.


End file.
